Abandoned the rewrite
by Shaggelmalove
Summary: I got an itch to revise the original to get my juices flowing again, enjoy   :D
1. Chapter 1

September 24th, 1998  
>Old Fort Niagara, Lake Erie<br>2:15 A.M.

The winds rushed, scraping against the aging stone of the battlement as the rain thundered down from the sky above. The thunder, a soft rage of the heavens, the lightening an ominous glow in the world above them. Inside by the fire on a bench of hard wood sat three small children, barely awake as the storm raged around them, protected by the warmth of the fire and the thickness of the stone. Together the waited, huddling close for the familiar touch of each other as a comfort in the strangeness of the night. Down the hallway the man that had brought them here paced the length of the hall that l just beyond the edge of the fireplace and out of their sight. An eruption of thunder cried out and the smallest of the group grabbed desperately onto her sisters as the door was pushed open. A man walked in and glanced at the shivering forms of the girls as the wind chilled them and fear seeped into their skin. He shook his head slowly and closed the door, walking down the hall towards the other man.

Xx

"Stan, brother. It's been a long time." Andrew stated as his brother met him in the hallway with a hard expression on his weathered face. "I'd begun to think you'd never forgive me."

"I came because of the girls Andrew, no reason beyond that." Stan said harshly as he removed his fedora and set it gently on the bench that lined the hall. "They deserve a better life than what you're giving them." Andrew swallowed and looked down.

"Look, it wasn't supposed to be this way. I never counted on what happened to... what happened the night we left. I never wanted to do this on my own. I need you to take them. I can't- I can't do this anymore, Stan." He looked to his brother pleadingly, but Stan still remained hard in expression as he stared down his younger brother. "Stan, you gotta listen to me on this; you have to take them. They;re young enough at this point where in a few years they won't even remember my face, you can make them forget me. Please, I'm begging."

A long silence followed between them. Finally, Stan broke the silence. "Andrew, this is the worst thing that I have ever seen you do as my younger brother. You're twenty-nine years old, start acting like a man and take some responsibility! Those girls are your daughters, not damn animals you can ship off to whatever wants them when times are bad." Glaring at him, he folded his arms.

"Don't you think I understand this! Just listen to me for once though, this is too damn dangerous now. If I keep them now they're at risk just as much as their mother was before they-" He stopped short and looked up at his brother. "I just... I need some time okay? I just need to work this out."

"What happened to Pam was a tragedy, we all know that, but you have to be able to move on and protect those girls. I'm giving you five years, Andrew, do you hear me, five. If you don't clean up your act and claim these girls by then, I'm going to make it my fucking job to make sure you never touch a damn hair on their heads ever again. Do you understand me? Five years." Andrew nodded and Stan picked up his fedora, replacing it on his head.

"Just... just tell them I love them and that I'll be back soon. It's a promise." As he turned to leave, he stopped. "Take good care of them, brother." And with that, he left. Stan shook his head and walked back out to where the three girls sat. They'd managed to fall asleep in a tangled mess. He sighed and took the smallest, a red-head with a mess of tangled curls and freckles on her heart-shaped face, from the pile. She snuggled against him in her sleep and he walked her out to the car that he he'd driven there. He strapped her into the backseat and went back for another girl of slightly curly hair of brunette hair that reached to her shoulders and placed her gently into the car next to her sister. Immediately she attached herself to the red-head sighing sleepily as she dreamed. When he turned to go back for the last, he'd found that she'd followed him out; already soaking wet as the rain pushed against her. Her eyes held a truth in them and he had an eery feeling that she'd heard, that she knew.

"Uncle Stan, I'm ready to go home now." She whispered and lifted her arms up to him. Not knowing what to do he lifted her up and placed her next to her sisters in the car. When he had climbed into the front-seat and started the car he thought for a second he'd heard her say, "I'm going to miss him."


	2. Chapter 2

September 24th, 2010  
>119 Bismarck Straße<p>

Nordrhein-Westfalen  
>Bonn, Germany<p>

3:22 p.m.

The wind brushed gently against her cheek as she sat on the window-seat of her bedroom window. Outside the leaves were swirling towards the green grass in shades of autumn as the cold weather began to close in on them. A warm breeze flooded the bedroom and her hair tumbled from her shoulders as it was brushed aside by the greeting of fall. The girl was silent as she stared at her world, her inquisitive green eyes lost in thought as they gazed forever onward. Her long hair blew about her softly, reaching down and past her lower-back in waves of an odd mixture of blond and brunette. Hugging her knees tight to her chest she sighed. Behind her the bedroom door opened and another girl stepped in. She too sighed upon seeing her sister once again at their bedroom window. Pulling a chair from their desks she sat next to her, taking a strip of hair and stroking it lightly. After a moment of silence she spoke.

"There's a Mystery Five marathon on today. You know you want to watch it with us." Her sister made no movement and she continued to stroke the long strip of hair. "There'll be Pepsi and Coca-Cola and all other sorts of sugary goodness downstairs," she coaxed. When no movement came she dropped the hair and sat directly across from her sister on the window-seat. "No amount of brooding is going to change things, Col." Finally looking at her sister, Colby shook her head gently. A knock on the door came and Jaz called out for them to step in. The last of the sisters entered their bedroom and sat in the vacated chair next to Colby.

"Any luck, Jaz?" Jasmine shook her head no, her straightened red hair tossing slightly as she did so. Pia nodded and rested her head on her twin sister's shoulder. Looking at them this closely you'd find it difficult to believe they were identical. Pia's shoulder-length brunette hair was bouncy and slightly curled and her eyes were anything but green when you looked into their misty gray depths. They were an oddity to science, appearing to be fraternal. It wasn't until tests were done that they had realized something had gone wrong. They were meant to look exactly the same, but for an odd reason the DNA rearranged itself thankfully only affecting the eyes and hair of the sisters physically. Internally nothing had changed but their way of thinking, making each an individual out of what was supposed to be the same. The world's first known pair of Semi-Identical Twins; SMI's as they were called.

"I just don't understand it." Colby finally broke the silence. "No one just disappears off the face of the Earth, not even the dead."

"So that's why you're all upset," Jaz concluded, "because our father magically disappeared twelve years ago? That happened forever ago, they've found nothing on him and they probably never will, it's no use brooding on it."

"Well not exactly," Pia spoke up in her twin's defense, "ever heard of the Zodiac Killer?"

"I thought they eventually caught him?"

"Nope," Colby stated calmly, "they thought they had when they arrested a man for a petty crime and after they let him go the murders continued, but there was no evidence it was him. Besides of what evidence they have, little is known about what's real and what's not. People like to play pretend." Jaz sighed.

"Alright, you make a point. Maybe our father isn't dead and missing, but there's nothing we can do about this anyway. Nothing we do is going to change the fact that we're fatherless. Besides if he's still dead they never caught his murderer, so we'd never know who to even ask about it."

"Well not necessarily, there are still a few people we can ask about it." Pia said, nodding her chin towards the floor. "Uncle Stan's never gone past saying that dad died, so maybe Colby's right and there is more to the story than we've been given."

"Look, let's just leave this alone, it's gotta be tough for Uncle Stan to speak about it. I mean, he was his baby brother and all."

"Alright, point valid. Let's just go downstairs and enjoy the marathon." Pia said as she took hold of her twins hand. Colby smiled and together they walked down the stairs and into the lowest level of the home, the study. The study was easily their favorite place in the entire home. It was enormous, filled with small alcoves and corridors and mazes of bookshelves everywhere that were filled to the brim with books in German, English, French, Italian, Latin, and several other languages. All over the place couches and armchairs and tables with plush dining chairs dotted the room. The walls were a deep purple and the bookshelves black as night. In total there were five fireplaces scattered throughout the room. Walking into an almost invisible alcove in the maze, Pia lit a small fire in the hearth of their favorite fireplace, the sweet smell of perfumed wood filling the air with the scent of sandalwood and jasmine. Above the fireplace a flat-screened television was turned on.

Walking over to one of the bookshelves that lined the walls of the alcove, Colby pulled back the shelf on it's hinges and opened the refrigerator beyond it, passing sodas and snacks back to her Jaz who placed them on the small coffee table that lay before the couch that hugged the wall of the small room. Next to the couch Pia placed a bag of popcorn in the microwave. Settling into the warm depths of the couch together they watched the marathon.


	3. Chapter 3

The Next Morning,  
>6:30 A.M.<p>

Everything went as it normally had in the home the following morning. The three sisters got dressed for school in their uniforms of blue plaid pleated skirts and tucked in button-down blouses with navy blue ascots tied around their necks. Downstairs in the kitchen, Uncle Stan made breakfast, the normal scent of apple-cinnamon pancakes and maple syrup beckoning the girls downstairs. At least once that morning Colby and Pia banged into an object or tripped over themselves as they normally did. In a matter of minutes they were all around the kitchen table, eating quietly. As usual half-way through Uncle Stan interrupted them with the his lecture of the morning. Routinely the girls picked up the index cards that lay next to their plates.

"Colby." Stan said sternly, nodding towards her. Flipping her card over she read what was printed on it in neat calligraphy: Morse Code. Clearing her throat she defined it. "Morse Code, information transmitted as lights, clicks or textual patterns to a skilled receiver who is able to decode the message easily. Extensions beyond the twenty-six letters of the English alphabet may be added varying to different languages that may be needed. Began in 1836 when Samuel F. B. Morse, Joseph Henry, and Alfred Vail developed the telegraph system." He nodded and she continued to eat her breakfast in silence.

"Jasmine." The red-head sighed and flipped over her card: Illuminati. "Illuminati," she began, "Latin plural for 'enlightened,' founded on May 1st, 1776 by Adam Weishaupt in Upper Bavaria. Sought to bring a new world order and favored scientific freedom and theory." Jaz tossed her card into the garbage and got up to rinse off her plate. Stan nodded and turned to Pia.

"Kunagi Code," looking up she gave her uncle an odd look but he simply nodded for her to continue, "Isn't that where you go up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, b, a, and start in a video game?" Their uncle smiled and nodded, jostling her hair as he got up to rinse off his own plate.

"You girls behave yourselves at school today, I don't want any calls that you've been mouthing off in class again. I'll be at work until five today, so you'll have the house to yourselves for a few hours." The girls nodded and their uncle gave them each a kiss on the head before leaving.

Xx

The girls walked side-by-side on the wide sidewalks of the city they'd grown up in on the way to Clara-Schumann Gymnasium. As they walked, Colby's thoughts were racing. So many things just didn't make sense. No body was recovered, for as long as they could remember they'd lived in Bonn and no pictures of their father resided with them, and they'd never even heard anything about their mother other than that she'd died giving birth to Jasmine fourteen years ago. They weren't even allowed to see their birth certificates because Uncle Stan said he had them stored away where they were born. Colby stopped, her blood chilled at the sudden realization. They were barely thirty minutes from where they were born.

Seeing that Colby had stopped, the other two turned to face her. "Colby?" Pia called to her. "Are you ok?" Colby smiled and quickly grabbed her sisters and brought them under the cover of a nearby willow tree that stood over the town graveyard.

"What if I told you guys I had a plan."

"I'd say let's go to school." Jaz said, turning to walk back onto the sidewalk.

"Come on you haven't even heard what I have to say yet." Colby pleaded, giving her younger sister the biggest puppy-dog eyes she could muster. Jaz sighed and turned back to face her sister. "First you gotta promise me you're not going to tell Uncle Stan anything, both of you." Her sisters nodded and she went on, taking a deep breath. "I want to find dad. Not because I want some long-lost relationship with a guy I've never met before if he's really alive and not because I think he's still alive."

"Then why?" Jaz asked impatiently. "If you don't think he's still alive, what's the point? He was never a part of our lives so why does he matter to you all of a sudden?"

"I don't know, I just- I have a feeling, okay. It's a little fuzzy but I could swear I remember something about him and I want to find out more about it. I feel like if we find him, I might be able to figure it out. Like, it'll clear it all up you know."

"But even the police couldn't find anything on our father when he went missing, no one could. What makes you think we can find anything?" Jaz challenged.

"She has a point." Pia spoke up. "We're just teenagers, nothing more."

"Look, I just want to try ok? You don't have to help me. They're my broken memories anyway."

"I just want to know something." Jaz said, giving her sister a skeptical glare. "Why do you even care so much about this? We have an uncle that watches over us. Our father's a broken memory at best so why is he worth chasing down if you don't want some long-lost relationship with him?"

"I just... I know, okay. I get it. He's never been there and he never will be. I just feel like I need to do this, I can't explain it, but I need to do this."

"Well if it's that important to you, I'm in." Pia said, smiling as she embraced her twin lovingly. "Besides, what harm could come from a look into our past, eh?"

"Yes, but how are we supposed to get that look, as I said earlier, we are not detectives, we're teenagers." Jaz interrupted.

"No, we're not detectives, but we're related to one." Colby said, smiling.

"You're not saying?"

"Oh yes I am. I think we have a much awaited overdue visit with our dear cousin Norville and his friends. But first, we need to take a trip ourselves." Colby's smile was almost devilish enough to scare Jasmine. Sighing, she asked a question.

"Is it worth skipping school?"

"Completely worth it."

"Well, what is it?"

"Are you in?" Jaz mumbled something beneath her breath in German but nodded just the same. "Follow me." Colby stated, marching off in the opposite direction of the school, Pia immediately following afterward with a very reluctant Jaz. 


	4. Chapter 4

Universität Klinikum Bonn  
>7:15 A.M.<p>

Together they walked through the spinning entrance doors of the hospital where they had been born more than a decade ago. Walking up to the receptionists counter Colby knocked twice on the surface and the woman working the desk looked up. "Yes, may I help you three?" Colby nodded.

"Can we please get a copy of our birth certificates?"

"May I ask why you need a copy of your birth certificates?"

"We're going on a class field trip and our uncle has our papers stored here."

"Alright, I'll need some identification and you'll need to write your names down for me." The woman said, handing Colby a clipboard with notepaper attached to it and a pen. Digging out their ID cards from school, they placed them on the counter as Colby began writing down their names. "Hmm," the woman said as she began searching them through the system. "Colby, Pia, and Jasmine Schuffhausen?" Colby nodded. "You don't seem to be showing up in our systems, what are your middle names?"

"Well mine are Marie Corrine and Khaos and -" the woman held up a hand to stop her.

"You'd better write that down sweetie." She said as she handed Colby back the clipboard. When she finished scrawling them down she handed it back. "Colby Marie Corrine Khaos, Pia Anna, and Jasmine Rose Leanda Schuffhausen?" Again Colby nodded and again their names refused to show in the system. "Hmm," the woman muttered again, "Are you sure the three of you were born here darling?"

"Positive." Colby said affirmatively.

"Well I'll go look in the back, if you're not back there I don't know what to tell you honey." The woman said as she got up and began going down the hallway. The three sat down together in the waiting room.

"You had us skip school to get a copy of our birth certificates?" Jaz said, annoyed that she'd gone all this way for something so fickle.

"Don't you think it's odd that we're not showing up?" Colby prompted. "If we were born here, our records would be here."

"She has a point, maybe there is more to the story than what we've been given." Pia added. "Why else would Uncle Stan need to lie about where we were born if he wasn't hiding something from us in the first place?"

"Don't tell me you think dad's alive?" Jaz questioned. "Why would he lie about his own brother's death!"

"I'm not saying I think he's alive and I'm not saying he's lying, I'm just agreeing with Colby that it's fishy is all. If we weren't born here, then where, Jaz?"

"I don't know but I think we should stop this. If Uncle Stan finds out we're even doing this we'll be in so much trouble. Plus it's adding insult to injury that we're investigating dad's death."

"Excuse me," The woman interrupted, "I'm sorry but we don't have any record of your births here."

"But that's impossible." Colby said, standing up. "We were born here. Our uncle even has a picture of us in front of the hospital door when me and Pia were born on October 25th. We had to have been born here."

"Well you're not in our records, chickie. Maybe you should ask your uncle if you were born somewhere else." The woman smiled as she ushered them out the door and onto the sidewalk. "Have a nice day!" She called cheerily before walking back into the hospital.

Xx

Walking home the three girls chatted quietly, unsure of what had just happened. "Why wouldn't be on record? We had to have been born there! We've never even been to another hospital." Colby muttered to herself. "He wouldn't lie about that, would he?"

"Why would he have to? What would be so special about where we were born that he'd want it kept a secret. It's not like it was anywhere special." Jaz answered, kicking rocks from her path with her school shoes as they walked. "Maybe we should just fake a note from Uncle Stan and call it a day back at school."

"There's no point, we've already missed our first class and the rest of the day is pretty much a blow off day anyways with our long weekend coming up." Pia stated as she brushed her loose hair behind her ear and trudged onwards. "We might as well go home."

"I still don't understand." Colby continued to mutter to herself. "So much just doesn't make sense anymore and I want it to stop."

"Then maybe we shouldn't go on with this investigation." Pia offered. "I mean our lives have been great, why worry ourselves over something that hasn't mattered in twelve years."

"Because it does matter. It matters more than you can imagine. Don't ask me to explain why, but I need to figure this out. I need to find him, or at least about him. I need to know who I am, is that too much to ask?" Pia sighed, putting a hand on her twin's shoulder.

"I know it matters to you," she stated calmly, "I just worry about you."

"You don't have to, I just... look let's just go home, okay?" Pia nodded and they continued to head home, the warm autumn wind caressing their cheeks and tantalizing their hair as they went. When they arrived at the home they stepped inside, immediately greeted by five dogs lapping at their hands. Walking towards the kitchen door Colby opened it.

"Amber, Polly, Angel, Jack, Diesel, go outside!" She told them, ushering them out the door. "I'm going upstairs." She said afterward, sliding her messenger bag to the floor. "I'll be in the attic if you need me."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa. Hold up. Why are you going into the _attic_?" Jaz demanded, arms folded across her chest. "What could possibly be up there aside from a few moldy books and a couch from ancient history?"

"I just wanted to see if there were any old photos up there, you know, from the past."

"Whose past?"

"Ours." Colby stated calmly, already halfway up the first flight of stairs leading up the fifth floor of the house. "Want to come with? Maybe I can find some nice ones of you in the bath?" Colby teased as she continued ascending. Frowning, Jaz grudgingly followed her, Pia close behind.

"Sometimes I wonder why we're related." Jaz grumbled to herself. Some days just weren't the best to have two older sisters. 


	5. Chapter 5

Filing towards the attic, followed closely by Colby's gray tabby cat, they opened the trap door on the fifth floor and the ladder to the attic descended. The rungs were layered in dust and creaked under the pressure of the girls. As soon as they ascended into the attic, Pia flipped the switch on, snuggling the tabby cat in her arms, his soft purr ringing out through the paint chipped walls and creaking floorboards. Walking over to the moth-eaten couch Colby dragged a box towards her, lifting the cardboard lid to reveal the contents. Inside were faded black and whites of people they hardly knew. Guessing they were distant relatives long since passed, she pushed the box away and began to walk towards a cluster of others. Turning to help her, Pia stepped forward, pausing when the normally creaky floorboard remained ominously silent beneath her feet.

Tentatively tapping the floor with her foot, she heard the familiar hollow sound that came from knocking against a sealed area. Setting the tabby on the couch she and Jaz examined the floorboard, Colby searching for something to pry it open with. "Strange... it doesn't seem to have any seams, it just molds perfectly into the rest of the floor." Pia muttered to herself as Colby approached with an old hammer.

"Try this," she said as she handed the tool over to her sister. Pia put the pronged end into one of the cracks in the floor and pulled to no avail. "I need help," she said, her sisters grabbing hold of her from behind. Together they pulled and a faint crack resounded throughout the dimly lit attic. Pulling again, they tugged harder; a satisfying creak filling the air as part of the floorboard broke off from the rest of it. Lowering herself to the floor, Colby peered through the opening. Inside was a small metal box, barely bigger than an average sized book. Trying to reach her hand through to get it, she realized her hand was too big for the opening. Scrambling back onto her feet, she joined her sisters and they placed the hammer at the new edge. Once again they set to pulling, breaking piece by piece what was left of the floorboard until Colby could easily lift the box from it's casement.

"Guys," Jaz finally spoke up, surveying the wreckage on the floor, "I don't think this such a good idea."

"A little late for that thought, Jazzy." Colby said as she too surveyed the wreckage of the floorboard. "You should of spoke up _before _ we broke the floor of the attic. Besides, where's your sense of adventure? Don't you want to know what Uncle Stan keeps locked up here in a little box?" Colby turned the box over examining it as she spoke. Saddened she noticed it required a key.

"Well I guess that answers it, let's just leave it where we found it and go? We can always say one of the dogs started digging at the floorboards again or try piecing the floor back together." Jaz sounded anxious. "Please?"

"Come on Jaz, don't you want to at least see what's in it?" Pia said as she too examined the box. "Besides I think I know where we might find a key."

"Where?" Jaz asked. "I mean, we don't even know what it is."

"Uncle Stan's private study."

"You're insane! You know we're not allowed in there without him, _ever_." Jaz protested.

"No, but we were also born at Universität Klinikum Bonn, weren't we?" Colby said snarkily. "What goes around comes around doesn't it? Besides he'll never know we were in there annyways."

Xx

A moment later and the girls were on the third floor of the home in front of the large oaken double doorway that opened into their uncle's study. Taking a cautious breath, Jaz reached out and turned the gilded handle. A dismaying click of the lock that blocked them from entering resounded and Jaz looked back over her shoulder, a panicked expression covering her baby face. Her blue eyes sparked for a moment with fear, almost as if she expected their uncle to turn the handle himself from the inside or an alarm to begin blaring throughout the home.

"Think," Colby muttered to herself, "if I were Uncle Stan, where would I hide a key from my three teenaged nieces..." She began to pace, a practice that calmed her nerves and allowed her to think. Much to the annoyance of Jaz and Uncle Stan, she paced quite often through the house; sometimes for hours at a time, her music blaring in her ears as she held tightly onto her Ipod in one hand and her glasses in the other.

"Well, if I were him, knowing us," Pia spoke up, cradling Colby's cat in her arms once more, "I know I'd put it somewhere we'd never think to look. We way over-complicate things sometimes and I feel like if I were him I'd know to hide it someplace right in front of us. You know, make it look too obvious to be it."

"True," Colby stated, picking up the cat that had leaped from Pia's arms and begun rubbing up against her legs, "but where would the obvious be?" Jaz almost smacked herself after her sister said this. Getting up from where she'd sat on the floor, she ran over to the linen shelves by the third floor guest bathroom. Kneeling onto the floor, she pulled the basket of spare sheets out from underneath the bottom-most shelf and crawled into the cramped space, her sisters watching her curiously. A moment later she resurfaced with a smile on her face, her baby blues sparkling, a few tiny dust balls tangled in her pony-tails. In her hand, she held a key painted white with pink polka-dots. Pia raised an eyebrow at the key's appearance.

"Uncle Stan gave me this forever ago when we were little." She explained. "He told me it was a house key. Now I finally understand why he gave a key to a kid with ADHD." She laughed. Smiling her sisters embraced her.

"Jazzy," Colby said, pulling from the embrace, "you're brilliant." Jaz handed her sister the key and cheekily replied, "I know." Colby rolled her eyes sarcastically and tossed her sisters hair before going to the door and turning the key in it's depths. For a moment, everything was silent, then a small metallic click sounded and Colby held her breath as she carefully tested the handle. Gently pushing her weight into one of the oaken doors, she entered the study. 


End file.
